Well, we are thrilled to announce that we are going to do this Challenge madness again!

We have gotten all of the gift certificates made.. not necessarily passed out, but I needed to start the new mystery because well, we’re using a secular, fun, wintry, Christmas panel. And yes, it’s, once again, a surprise.

I think I, along with the help of my husband, Ken, did a fabulous job of picking out fabrics that match. However, there is a challenge to these fabrics: They are all Christmas colors.

You, however, do not have to create a Christmas quilt or quilted item. You can create whatever you want, though the panel is a secular wintry, Christmas panel. You can cut out the gifts, if you just want a winter look; Keep the snow. Keep the other things. Do whatever you want. In fact, you can mutilate the panel and turn it into a dress. We don’t care.

But, whatever you do, we want you to know that we’ll get it back to you in plenty of time to use for a Christmas gift. (Our goal is back to you on Dec. 1 or close to it)

The Mystery Challenge Packs are on sale NOW for just $29. It really is a steal. You can add more fabrics to it if you choose, as we have more of everything for sale, at least for the time being. I will probably run out of the plaid, but the other 5 items, we have plenty of!
That’s enough hints!

So, here’s the rules once again!

This is a Quilted Twins sponsored Challenge, so our staff is exclusively and collectively responsible for picking the winners!

The goal of this contest is to challenge you, collectively, as a group of smart, creative, sewists, quilters and crafters, to come up with something that is quilted and meets the following briefs!

1. You must use some of all the fabrics**. Your packet has 1 panel and 5 half yards of coordinating fabric. (You may purchase additional fabrics, and the codes to the fabrics included are on a piece of paper in your mystery packet.)

2. You may not throw out the panel, but you may toss out one of the other fabrics and/or add ONE additional (and only one) fabric. Trust me, we know the fabrics in this, so we know if you try to slip an extra one in on us! The backing and bindings are not part of that fabric number count. **So, if you throw out a fabric, of course, you’re not going to be using that.

3. Please make the longest side no larger than 70”. (We did 75” last time and that was just too big for our hanging space.

4. At least one small part of your project, no matter what it is, needs to be quilted. For this Challenge, Quilted means THREE layers, held together with some kind of stitching. Please make it visible enough that we don’t have to guess, pull your project apart or otherwise contact you to see if you met that brief.

5. Your project MUST be completed. The project, no matter what it is, needs to be completed. You do NOT need to have a label to be considered complete. No incompleted tops will be judged. No one usually puts labels on clothing, placemats, mug rugs, and bowls, etc., unless they are a professional doing things for sale. So, that’s why no need for labels.

6. We will only be judging entries received in person this time. No pictures only entries. It was too hard to see the details, even with great photos.

7. We love creativity and outside the box thinking!

8. We will need to have all entries to us by Nov. 20, so we can get them judged and back to you.

We need to have at least 20 entries received back to give out the largest prize of a $150 gift certificate!

Second place will be $100 gift certificate and third place, $50. If we get enough fun and different entries, we will award more prizes, but of course, without knowing how many are going to be entered, we are only promising the top three places, though there will undoubtedly be more!

Think: aprons, clothing items, smocked dresses, quilts, pillows, bench pillows, appliqued winter scene, bags, totes, skirts, shorts, table runners, wall hangings, tree skirts, hats, duffel bags, and Becky even came up with some other country flags using red, white and green, though it probaby doesn’t work too well for us, unless you’re from one of those other countries!

Get creative! Have fun! We love and appreciate all of you!

Get your Challenge Packet winging its way to you HERE.

—Rachael and Becky

(Rachael health update: I find out something on Tuesday about what’s wrong with me, I hope. I’ll take this notice away after a while, because there’s no need for people to be reading about my health next month!) But trust me when I say that I appreciate all of you who have been praying for me. I have no visible signs of any apparent illness. I just have no energy level, have had a low grade fever, and am now on an a strong antibiotic, which has NOT conquered it yet, and I have only one more pill to go. Ugh. )

Be sure to check out what my sis has for you in the store here!

Feel free to browse the site.